Category: Personal Growth

We have been taught death is about loss.

We mourn death.

We cry, tear clothing…fall into despair.

No more hugs. No more long conversations to the early morning light.

They are gone.

Yet while they were here, did we see them every day? No

And though we didn’t always see them, or talk to them, they enriched our lives every day.

How? Because our love made us one.

Regardless of what life offered, we knew how they thought, and what they would say. We knew they loved and supported us come what may. Knowing them made our lives better.

Does death make us forget? No

Losing physical contact is a profound loss, but once we make the emotional and spiritual connection through the love we share, we never, EVER lose each other.

This is why we should love as many people as we can. Certainly every person who contributes to making our lives worth living. Because in the absence of genuine love, physical connection is all we share…

…And death truly becomes a total loss.

I matter.

You matter.

Each of us offer our unique perspective on the reality we experience.

Each of us contribute individually to our Ecology.

Our individuality is the prism that translates our experiences and ultimately defines how we choose to connect to reality.

But our individuality is not enough for survival.

To survive, we rely on many other individuals, past and present, to provide the knowledge, thoughtful discretion, productivity and resource management to maintain the environment that supports daily living.

While experience teaches few truths are absolute, human interdependence informed by individual ingenuity is the essential truth of our existence.

Therefore, I matter, and You matter, but only WE will do…for us to prosper.

Contemplate the important factors that make your life meaningful…the person you share your life with…your children…your chosen vocation…a personal passion like painting or writing. For each of these factors, we made a simple choice that opened up the possibility for a lifetime of fulfilling experiences. At the moment of that first choice, we may have had no idea how impactful our decision would become. Yet as small, subtle and seemingly insignificant as that first choice may have been at the time, our lives would be profoundly less satisfying had we made a different choice.

This is how change occurs.

As we consider our present state of personal fulfillment, we have the opportunity to make a choice to seek the fulfillment we deeply desire; Or we can choose to do what we are already doing, which only resigns us to a life of fleeting moments of happiness. This commentary is written to everyone who chooses to seek fulfillment.

How do I get from where I am to a fulfilling life?

Assess where you are. How do you spend your days? What drives the decisions that frame your life? Given how you spend your time, how much of your day is spent doing things you would not do but for the need for money? Assess how money defines your relationships, activities, skills, interests, outlook, self worth, security, health, wellness, stature, and worldview. Does any of this serve you? Does any of this impact  your personal fulfillment? Do you think more money would lead to your fulfillment? If not money, then what will it take?

The first step toward your fulfillment is realizing where you stand does not serve you.

Ok, if I am not fulfilled working hard every day, playing by the rules, paying my taxes, doing everything society expects me to do, then what will it take? Simply asking the question is the second critical step toward fulfillment.

We organize our lives based on a core set of social values, taught to us by our families, and reinforced by the cultural expressions of our society. As an American, these values are independence, self-determination, freedom, and the pursuit of our own happiness. These values define our politics (democracy) and our economics (capitalism). These values emphasize individualism over community, encourage competition as a means of validating privilege, and accommodates dehumanizing deprivation as the price for losing.

In America, the poor do not hate the rich because they aspire to be rich one day. The rich do not lift the poor out of poverty because deprivation is the incentive for the poor to work themselves out of poverty. Both the rich and the poor share a common commitment to our core American values. Yet most people, regardless of their wealth, are not fulfilled.

Why?

There is an economic concept called the law of diminishing returns, which references the satisfaction we realize as we experience a phenomenon multiple times. For example, consider your satisfaction if you eat your favorite meal tonight. Then tomorrow, your best friend takes you out and pays for you to have your favorite meal again. Then your boss takes you to lunch to celebrate a promotion and again buys you your favorite meal. For most people, eating your favorite meal would be less enjoyable the third day than it was the first day. The law of diminishing returns is a meaningful method for assessing the endurance of our personal satisfaction, and a thoughtful means of distinguishing personal satisfaction from fulfillment.

Satisfaction brings us fleeting moments of happiness, but fulfillment brings us joy that never wanes. Consider how you feel when you do something that really makes a difference in the life of someone you love. Do you ever get bored with this feeling? This is fulfillment.

Now consider the experiences in your life that generate fulfillment. Do any of these experiences emphasize your individual interest over the interest of anyone else? In fact, if we are completely honest, the one common denominator of experiences that bring fulfillment is our commitment to any interest beyond our own.

By reconsidering our American values, we take the next critical step toward a life of fulfillment.

…my pace slows.

My breath deepens.

Awareness sharpens.

In this moment I learn so much more about who I am…where I am…why now matters.

For the first five decades of my life, I never experienced this depth of my reality. As if I spent my youth skimming the surface of life, I now am immersed in the richness of an increasingly vivid consciousness.

What am I learning?

The upper currents of life demand conformity, while the lower currents encourage free awareness, self actualization, and clarity. I surmise the upper currents are crowded because that’s where most of us live. Conformity becomes necessary for movement to be possible.

But as I slow to the deeper currents, I’m free. Free to breathe slowly and deeply. To notice the subtle and the vivid. And the deeper I travel in this very moment, the more connected I feel to humanity, nature, and eternity.

Still waters do run deep.

Find your stillness and you will discover your Nirvana.

Each night I close my eyes, I leave behind the concerns of the day. I suspend reality as I submit to the blissful recharge of a good night’s sleep. As thoughts of the day recede, a new subconscious reality emerges. Here, I realign my conscious and subconscious identity by hearing the message of unspoken truth.

This morning, the question I awoke to is “how do we get to a place where our values undermine our humanity?” I arrived here by separation alone. From the moment my self view starts and ends with “I”, my consciousness detaches from my humanity.

A worldview seen through the prism of ‘I” encourages self preservation at the expense of anyone else.

From birth, I was taught to think this way. I loved anyone who fed me, who cleaned me, who comforted me. As I grew older, I learned to distrust other people because they are not inclined to make me comfortable. They want and need what I want and need, but I was taught there is not enough for both of us. Consequently, I cultivate personal alliances of mutual self-service, and work to provide the resources that secure us.

Fortified by the virtues of individual liberty and the pursuit of my own happiness, I am encouraged to take for my self and my alliance all the resources I can. To save and protect my accumulating resources for myself and the few who make me comfortable. I rationalize that I earned my mountain of resources, therefore I deserve the privilege of keeping them for myself.

The great irony here is gluttony breeds emptiness. The more I accumulate, the more detached I become.

And so, sleep brings a promise of relief, only to reveal what I was told is a lie.

I did not create myself. I did not raise myself. I did not teach myself. I do not feed myself. Any fulfillment I experience is inspired by someone else.

The dissonance pervading my life is the virtue of an “I” centered worldview, at odds with the reality of my existence.

I am part of one humanity. I am fed by my connection with humanity. As we prosper, I prosper. And as humanity suffers, I suffer. Up to this moment, I lived a life of serving myself and my alliance at the expense of humanity.

Today, I finally awoke from my nightmare.

How did I get here? So far from my aspirations I can no longer remember what they were.

I’m a banker. I help business owners access the capital they need to develop and grow their businesses. I’m good at it. I actually enjoy adding value to my client’s business operations.

The thrill for me is no request is the same. Each borrower is unique. I immerse myself into their life’s story and out of my review emerges an indigenous strategy to improve their business.

So why am I unfulfilled?

Money.

I help people by providing the optimal amount of money to achieve their financial goals. And while this is the best I can do given our free market economy, I know the accumulation of money is the primary cause of the inhumanity that pervades modern life.

Despite the virtue of individual liberty, we are one humanity. We share one planet that produces a finite amount of resources at any given time. We ALL need money to access the resources that sustain us. As I help my clients accumulate money, I must acknowledge the unintended consequence: resource deprivation for so many other people.

I am lost. And I won’t be found until I reconcile my vocation with my highest aspirations.

Beyond life’s few certainties, death and taxes, reside the space for spiritual and emotional growth that offers each of us the opportunity to find fulfillment.

At the moment of our conception, our nature is hard wired with a wide range of physical inclinations that manifest based on the nurture we receive. Optimally, we incubate for forty weeks where we transform into a life ready to function separate from our womb. Our development is a function of our mother’s physical and emotional well being…her access to proper shelter, healthy nutrition, exposure to toxins, physical & emotional stress, and prenatal care.  We reach the first stage of our full potential when we are born as a healthy, fully formed baby.

In our infancy, our genetic inclinations are cultivated based on an intricate, intimate web of emotional and physical relationships. Our developmental security is achieved through the formation of an external womb commonly known as family. Here we experience emotional clarity: we are fulfilled when our personal space is synonymous with our family; Otherwise, we are miserable.

During our toddler stage, we are introduced to societal norms…familial roles, culture, personal space, and morays. Here our family prepares us for a second birth…into the world beyond the family.  This second stage ends as we embark on our formal education.

Our educational stage, typically in the US from the age of 5 through 18 and beyond, provides the physical, emotional and spiritual foundation of our personal development. Here we get the first glimpse of who we are and how we connect to world around us. We are exposed to the lessons of history, and are provided our first opportunity to internalize those lessons for application in our daily lives. Our full potential is achieved at this third stage when we enter adulthood as a physically, emotionally, and spiritually healthy person, fully empowered to contribute to the broader society.

Our baseline expectations are set. The range of career opportunities are framed for primary selection. We are expected to make the choices that will shape the rest of our lives. The core question is how many of us are fully prepared when our critical choices must be made? What are the consequences if we are not ready?

This is where so many of us learn the cruel reality of modern life. Our baseline expectations of building a life that provides security for ourselves and our families are all too often exposed as a romantic notion called free market competition. Yet the competition is not free or fair.

We put our heads down and work like mules in the hopes of earning our way to our dream life. Five, ten years go by, we meet a person who brings us glimpes of happiness. We get married. Now our desire to find security becomes more urgent because it is not just us anymore. Dreams of a life of fulfillment fade into distant memories behind a busy array of tasks and responsibilities.

Why is modern life not more fulfilling today? We have simply exchanged spending most of our time producing what we need to survive, with spending most of our time earning the money to survive. Given all of the technological advances, and the abundance of natural resources, today we have the capability to provide all of humanity the resources each of us can use to reach our full potential.

So what stands in our way? A system of economics that encourages us to take unto ourselves as much as we can. A value structure that indoctrinates us into believing we are separate, independent, self interested individuals who can expect in life only what we earn.

Yet who amongst us earned the mother’s womb that gave us life? Or the years of nurturing provided by our families? Or the countless lessons provided by teachers, mentors, family and friends? In fact, who amongst us earned the love we receive?

We have known since Copernicus that we are not at the center of the universe. The lesson here is we are part of the universe. We are individual members of one humanity who share one planet. Each of us are vitally important because we possess enormous potential to contribute to our well being. In our modern society, we each rely on many individuals to produce the living conditions that sustain us.

How many young adults today are fully empowered to reach their full potential? How many are sufficiently informed to master their highest vocational aspirations? Almost none when compared to our global population.

Up to this moment, even in the richest country on Earth, almost all people live their entire lives working jobs they otherwise would not do but for the need to make money. For a while, desire for money generated higher productivity, but current data indicates this time has passed. Fulfillment is the ultimate inspiration for productivity. To do daily what you feel most passionate about is the fuel that is forever sustainable.

The next step of our social evolution is to align our values with the wisdom of our human experience. E pluribus Unum…out of many, one. Each of us, no matter where we live, is too valuable to waste. None of us, no matter our privilege, can survive without the rest of us. Therefore, we best advance our individual well being by empowering each of us to reach our full potential.

I didn’t.

I contributed. I worked hard to acquire the best education possible. Yet, virtually everything I know was first developed by someone else, and taught to me by someone else.

Today, I’m a talented, experienced small business banker. I still remember the person who hired me in my first position as a Disaster Assistance Loan Officer for FEMA. I remember each person who hired me for each position I held thereafter, including the one I hold now.

The most impactful contributors to my career have been the borrowers who came to me for the financing they needed to rebuild their lives or achieve their goals.

I vividly recall the school teacher who lost his home and most of his possessions due to devastating floods that hit southern Georgia in 1994. He and his wife had been married for a few years and were expecting their first child. They had invested all of their savings in their modest home. There was no way on a teacher’s salary they could afford to rebuild their home and pay the existing mortgage. The Disaster Assistance Program offered a 30 year mortgage at the government’s cost (30 years fixed at 4% vs. Market rates of 10%) that financed the total reconstruction of the home, refinanced the existing mortgage, and replaced the destroyed personal property, all for less than the original mortgage payment. I was able to approve an exception to policy to lower their final payment because their original mortgage payment was half of their monthly earnings. When I told the borrower what I was able to approve, he cried. I’m crying now just thinking about it.

In 2015, I had a borrower who came to me for financing to buy 5 Domino’s Pizza franchises in Arkansas. The borrower had no significant collateral to secure the loan but was offering his life’s savings as the down payment. This borrower had started working at one of the Domino’s stores as a pizza delivery man twenty year ago. He worked his way up to shift manager, then store manager, then larger store manager, and finally general manager of all 5 stores. The franchise owner was retiring and wanted to sell his stores to his best employee. I never met this borrower personally, and he never met me. But people like him are why I became a banker. His was the proudest loan of my career.

No, I didn’t build this.

All the people who paved the way for me; All the people who taught me; All the people who believed in me; All the people who hired me; And all the borrowers who gave me the opportunity to provide financing…together we built this.

How about you?

Has time ever stopped for you?

Your mind was quiet. What’s next didn’t matter. You even forgot where you were. And for a moment, you almost felt boundless.

It didn’t have to be a romantic moment. It could have happened any where. The one compelling feature was the capture of at least one of your senses. But in that moment, you only felt connected to someone…to some thing…and in that instant nothing else mattered.

Then life began again. The noise returned. Yesterday defined tomorrow without consideration for today. And the serenity you felt in that instant receded just beyond your reach.

Modernity deceives us into believing…doing breeds fulfillment. Yet actual experience teaches us… being is our ultimate experience. Consider the last time you felt abundant fulfillment. Regardless of the reasons that led to your ultimate satisfaction, you only realized it when you stopped, and let it soak all the way in.

In that moment you felt love. There is no happier feeling than when we suspend our busy lives and connect with the world that surrounds us.

Inversely, every other moment is defined by our preternatural loneliness, disguised as boredom, or listlessness, or anxiety…

President Kennedy was right. “Our problems are man-made. Therefore, they can be solved by man.”

As we consider all the problems effecting our lives, let our consideration start with ourselves. What about our situation, our values, and our choices are contributing to the problems we see? For me, most of my choices have been consumed with providing for myself and my family. And as I look back over my life, I realize how much pride and satisfaction I experienced when I achieved success. Yet, with each success, I foreclosed the same opportunity for every person who didn’t get hired or competed but failed to close the big deal. I’m familiar with their misery because I too have been defeated on many occasions.

My takeaway is something is deeply wrong with people having to compete to provide for themselves and their families. The competition is inherently unfair because our access to education and skill development is tied to the randomness of birth. Therefore, our success in the competition of life is more driven by luck than talent or hard work. My pride in providing for my family is a celebration of good fortune at the expense of others. As I am confronted by the problems resulting from the accumulated misfortune, I must own my contribution and do something about it.

The first step of fundamental change is realizing where you stand is no longer acceptable. But if not here, then where?

Good fortune is a function of this life no matter what we do. Some people are healthier, stronger, faster, possess greater aptitude for learning, etc. For people who are fortunate, the opportunity to make great contributions to society are likely. But good fortune should not determine our ability to provide for ourselves and our families. There is no honor in denying the less fortunate the resources they need, especially when we possess the technology and resource capacity to sustainably provide for all of humanity.